


A Shrike in the Night

by K_Popsicle



Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Assassination Attempt(s), Blood, Character Study, Gen, Murder
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:29:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 838
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25502899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/K_Popsicle/pseuds/K_Popsicle
Summary: Staying alive has a cost.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 7
Collections: Battleship 2020, Battleship 2020 - Yellow Team





	A Shrike in the Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [araydre](https://archiveofourown.org/users/araydre/gifts).



Renfri hasn’t eaten in all day, mouthfuls from dirty streams as she stalked her target. They’ve been in company on the road, three men and two women who set up camp each night and huddle close against the winter wind. Renfri watches them as they sleep, stalks the edges of their firelight and watches the target in their midst. She _could_ kill him as they sleep. But there’s no way to get him without taking out the others. She could do it, stalk up to their group and slit each throat one at a time before they can cry out to warn the others. But it’s safer, easier, to wait for the parties to separate.

Renfri retreats to her own camp where there’s no fire and no friends to warm her, but she’s safe. There no beacon for the monsters to be drawn to, just her sword on her knees, and her horse keeping their own silence. They wait out the night and start a third day stalking her prey.

They stop at an inn in the next town, one of the women complaining because it’s too cold and she needs a bed or she’ll _die_ and Renfri chews on days old bread and thinks about the money she’ll have if the client pays up. If they don’t she’ll have to kill them too.

She waits for the cover of night, leaves her horse in a thicket of forest where no-one will look, and creeps through the village on silent feet. Assassinations aren’t her usual thing, but she follows the money, too poor to be picky. Besides she’s good at it, small and quick and she never asks questions. She doesn’t want to know whose good, whose bad, she wants to survive- no matter the cost. There’s too much against her right now. Later, later she’ll have the luxury of morals and higher ground. Tonight she has a sharp blade and a target.

She gets into his room too easily, no-one guarding the back entrance to the establishment. He’s not alone in his bed, another woman laying there curled up in his arms, and Renfri almost turns away. Almost waits for another chance. But two is better than six. Two is- she can balance that for a meal today.

The woman dies with a judder, eyes big and wide and terrified, and Renfri wants to take it back but it’s too late. It’s a fleeting thought, not the first time she’s had it. The man feels the woman in his arms twitch and makes to run for it. He tumbles out of the bed. The woman’s blood is on everything, on her hands, her knife, her target. Renfri jumps across the bed after him, and he cries out, calls for help. She can hear people stir as she knocks him down and stabs at him. She’s got to be fast, faster. He should never have made a sound but it’s too late. Too late.

She stabs down into his lower back, the closest target, six- seven times to slow him down because he’s _bigger_ than her. The flick of her knife is fast, vicious, and he makes little jerking cries with each blow body twitching but not dead because he’s still crawling towards his sword. Renfri scrambles to her feet and gets the sword first even though he tries to catch her ankle. There are people trying to open the door, shouting. She stabs him through the neck as he tries to scramble away in the other direction. A clean strike that slices through and shuts him up. He sprays blood across her, she lets go of the sword and lets his body drop to the ground. There’s blood everywhere, all over her skin and clothes. There’s no way out the way she came so she sheaths her knife and leaves by the window.

The village is still asleep, but Renfri knows it won’t stay that way. People are shouting, as she climbs up to the roof, but people are screaming by the time she’s gone over the peak and dropped down to the back. She leaves bloody footprints behind her, she can see it on the straw even in the dim lit night so she heads north to the river and wades into its freezing depths to wash off the excess. Her teeth chatter and she ducks herself under to remove the worst of it before she lets the current carry her silently back past the village. She hears the village breaks into uproar as she strips her clothes and puts on something dry. The lights are being lit as she rides away.

When she receives her coin it’s lighter than she was promised. She considers taking it anyway. Her bones feel cold, she’s barely eaten, but she’s done letting people use her. She kills them quickly, cleanly, raids their pockets for extra coin and finds a fresh set of clothes with no blood stains, then leaves with none the wiser. She doesn’t feel guilty at all.


End file.
